In Search of Frank Bowers...

A mural that was once in the cocktail lounge at Mar-Lin-Do Lanes, Burbank.

The lanes closed 8/84 to be replaced with apartments. Photo from Marlindo Memories.

TC, using that bottle of what I think is Galiano for scale ,I ’d guess thats about a 3’x 8’ foot section of the mural. I’m afraid to ask what became of it?
Mahalo

On 2013-09-05 13:52, azurebird wrote:

Hi folks, I am an art dealer in Fallbrook and new to this forum. A client showed me these two paintings they own by Frank and Vicki Bowers this morning and I am trying to get more information about the artists beyond the obvious. One painting is signed by both artists and dated 1951. It is supposedly out of a deceased bar in the Long Beach area called the Ark hence the subject matter. One mural is 48 x 55, the other 48 x 60".

A quick search turned up nothing on the particular saloon and I guess the name could be off but I will continue to research the matter. Any help that you can provide will be appreciated. I will probably get them cleaned (they are filthy) and then sell them.

Sincerely,

Robert Sommers
Blue Heron Gallery

[ Edited by: azurebird 2013-09-06 08:36 ]

Probably nobody cares about this after all these years but I found this information and just had to post it to share.

ARK CAFE 5029 East Ocean Blvd, Long Beach, CA
not sure when it opened/closed but it was open in the 1960's and it's gone now

Here is owner Bud Seig

[->>King Bushwich 33rd on Hulu.com

I for one DO care. I love bar murals, and this thread has become THE source of reference when anybody searches for Frank Bowers on the web.

Frank must have painted a mural in every bar in Long Beach, it seems :)

forgive me if this site is well known https://lamodern.com/2013/09/frank-bowers-l-a-muralist/

Well, it's been posted here before, and has gleaned much of its info from this TC thread :)

Here's another Frank Bowers mural, this one is a circus theme in three parts. The owner sent me these images as well as the following message. Any leads?

Hello,
I purchased a Frank & Vicki Bowers Circus Mural about 20 years ago. I rolled it up and put it into storage. I am wondering if you might have any Ideas as to which Bar Room it may have come from. I purchased from an estate liquidator in the city of Commerce,CA., who referred to it as a former Dive Bar Art Piece. I will appreciate any help that you can offer in locating the original display location for the Circus Mural Art. The center piece is 75" x 48" and the two flanks are 57" x 40".
Thanks and Best Regards,

[ Edited by: Hakalugi 2016-11-21 10:55 ]

Many Thanks Hak...anything new is awesome...LOVE me some Bowers...DON'T care for clowns.:)

Cool! He managed to get some boobs in -barely- in the form of the organ carriage. That must have been a strange dive bar! Maybe a clown hang-out? :wink:

Some clown will buy these.
No really, sell them at a clown convention, or even the casino Circus Circus in Las Vegas.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••**•
MERRY CHRISTMAS from TIKISKIP!

Maybe Stephen King! Haha..Sven said Organ Carriage. Seriously, I DON'T LIKE CLOWNS...childhood nightmares. Does anyone really like them?

Fund this photo on-line of a mural at the Station Compliment NCO Club that sure looks to be the work of Frank Bowers. Amazing mural wrapped around the doors to the officers club.

I could not find out where Station Compliment was located?

DC

Could it be that Station Compliment is a unit name and not a location? Like a support unit for transportation, communication etc? Looks like Michael George Sosnoskie served in WWII but I don't have an Ancestry account so I can't see any details. Born 1908 in Northumberland, Pennsylvania but I don't know where he served. Ancestrydotcom has bought all the genealogy and records sites so you can't get anything free anymore :(

Any chance Bowers went to Florida? I can track Michael Sosnoskie to Camp Blanding, FL in the early '40s. I also found this:

*Construction was begun on an installation suitable for accommodating one Brigade shortly after the purchase of the Camp Blanding site. The facilities consisted of two Regimental Headquarters buildings facing opposite sides of a parade field, and behind each headquarters building, a row of administrative buildings, mess halls and latrines. The plan was to house virtually all of the Summer Camp troops in tents near these buildings. Construction also was begun on an Officer's Club overlooking Kingsley lake. The club was named Cooper Hall, in honor of then Capt. Ralph W. Cooper, who, as State Quartermaster, supervised construction of the initial facilities. Capt. Cooper would later retire as a Brigadier General.

As fate would have it, the World War II mobilization brought Federal troops to Camp Blanding before the Officer's Club was ready for occupancy, and the Florida National Guard officers who designed and built Cooper Hall were not allowed to use it until after he war. (Cooper Hall was to become the Officer's Club for the Station Complement -primarily the doctors and nurses at the Camp Blanding Station Hospital. Other officers assigned to the Post would use other clubs.)*

[ Edited by: HopeChest 2017-08-11 11:23 ]

"Frank had three children, Jackson Bowers who drummed with Gene Krupa and disappeared somewhere in Florida around 1947 or 1948"

Hmmm... Maybe?

Off topic, but MAN - how good of a drummer would you have to be to drum with Gene Krupa?!?!?

Right?

On 2011-12-13 19:35, bigbrotiki wrote:
John-O, you're such a lush! Well, here is MY groundbreaking discovery -except it's not really mine, it was BORIS who discovered this previously unknown piece of Bowers ephemera, and I thank him very much!

I apologize in advance/ in retrospect if I outbid anyone on this (Sabu? John-O?), but I just had to have it:

I show most but not all pages, Bowers' style was definitely Pre-Tiki, more 30s/40s...

The animals were drawn by his wife Vicki.

And here's what WE like, the...

My favorite is actually the back cover:

wow these are awesome!!! Id love to pattern my style after him!!! i need these books!!! INCREDIBLE tiki style
he was ahead of his time !!!!

On 2016-08-06 16:41, msteeln wrote:
forgive me if this site is well known https://lamodern.com/2013/09/frank-bowers-l-a-muralist/

above link is broke so here is updated link
https://lamodern.com/auctions/2013/10/1/469

and here is the content in case that link gets broken soon. It's a three-panel mural
Lot 469: Frank Bowers
Mural
1947
Oil on canvas
Signed and dated "Frank Bowers/47" lower left
71" x 400"
Estimate: $18,000 - $25,00

Frank Howard Bowers (1905-1964) was an American painter and muralist born in California. He moved to Los Angeles during the Depression Era and was assigned to execute grand-scale murals for the WPA's Federal Art Project as part of President Roosevelt's New Deal program. Noteworthy commissions include a mural for the interior of the South Gate, California City Hall in 1941, and a series of murals for the Fruit Growers Exchange in Downtown Los Angeles (also known as the Sunkist Building, which has since been demolished) in the early 1930s. Aside from his involvement in the Federal Art Project he also leisurely painted several custom oil on canvas murals for bars and lounges in and around Long Beach and South Los Angeles. Some of the commissions were reportedly in exchange for his bar tab.

This mural was executed for the interior of restaurateur Vivian Laird's Restaurant and Jungle Room in Long Beach. Los Angelenos may find some of these tremendous murals in situ at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Hall and Buccaneer Lounge in Sierra Madre, Foc'sle Bar in Wilmington, and outside state lines at the Hard Hat Lounge in Las Vegas, Nevada.

This picture and story was posted by Tikicoma on Facebook:

"This is Irish McCalla, before she was Sheena of the Jungle, painting one of 2 twelve foot long tropical looking murals at a restaurant in Los Angeles. The picture was in Eve Magazine no.1 which looks to have been published in Oct.1950. She says it was an expensive restaurant near Otis College of Art and Design"

Sure looks like a Bowers to me, here is a comparison to the Leilani mural:

DC

I spotted this photo over on the Leilani Hut thread. First time I have ever seen the Bower's mural at the Leilani Hut in situ. Gives you an idea on how big it was. Wish there was a full photo of it.

Looks like a Hawaiian festival scene with a couple of Uke players and some drums.

DC

Some new info on Mr. Frank Bowers. I found a newspaper clipping that gives us the first real glimpse of Bower's impressive artistic history. Went to Stanford, Cal Arts, worked in Hollywood, sketch artist on Gone With the Wind, and more miles of murals than any other artist ever. Pretty amazing!

One of the murals mentioned was a 2,600 SF fresco at the Sister Kenny Foundation in El Monte.

Another was from the First Methodist Church in Huntington Park, looks like it is still there.

Finally, I discovered that the Bowers murals from the Sunkist building now reside at the Ventura County Agricultural Museum in Santa Paula. Need to stop by for a look.

DC

My latest acquisitions !! Coming soon to a public space near you. 🙂

[ Edited by JOHN-O on 2022-03-15 16:30:20 ]

@JOHN-O, I'm a big Frank Bowers fan. They are stunning. Are they on stretchers or on wood backing? Are they available to see in public place? I will definitely come see them.

[ Edited by Jethro on 2022-08-01 12:18:39 ]

I don't believe that Bowers painted murals in bars to support his drinking habit. This is tale they say about many artist. They said this about A.D.M. Cooper who painted many nudes and western paintings for bars all over the West. He was a very wealthy man during his lifetime.

[ Edited by Jethro on 2022-08-01 12:59:11 ]

[ Edited by Jethro on 2022-08-01 13:00:49 ]

[ Edited by Jethro on 2022-08-10 01:19:37 ]

[ Edited by Jethro on 2022-08-10 01:21:17 ]

Those are FABULOUS John-O! Congrats...Can't wait to hear the story.

BTW, I'm selling a copy of the book on Marketplace.

[ Edited by Or Got Rum? on 2022-08-05 10:14:19 ]

You can see John-O's new acquisitions here: https://www.catalinamuseum.org/upcoming-exhibits/all+upcoming+exhibits/tall-tiki-tales-catalina-as-a-south-seas-island

A bunch of us Tikiphiles will be traveling out for the opening of the exhibition in support of Sven and the exhibit.

Very interesting. Back in late May, I watched a Polynesiasploitation film called "Bird of Paradise" (1932) directed by King Vidor and set partly on Catalina. Then my family and I stayed on the island during Memorial Day weekend.

Based on his established connection to the citrus industry in Southern California, it's not too much of a stretch to think he may have done orange-crate label art early in his career, like this one I found at an estate sale:

Though not signed, (like most label art), the style seems to be his:

Printed in 1928 by the Western Litho Co. of Los Angeles:

Another local label printed by Western Litho of Los Angeles that is also in his style:

Really interesting angle and find, Sabu. It's a good theory. I know Don Blanding did various commercial work back in the day...

I will be offering this seven foot long charcoal sketch at Palm Springs Modernism next week. It is a study Bowers created for a mural at the Bacchus Room at the old Monarch Hotel. A gentleman contacted me whose late grandmother owned the study. The Monarch hotel had a quite storied past.https://www.onbunkerhill.org/themonarch/

[ Edited by azurebird on 2024-02-09 20:30:23 ]

I like the charcoal sketch of the Bacchus Room. Thanks for the 3 images of the painting. They don't quite overlap so something must be missing. Please post a photo showing the whole art in one photo? How much are you asking for it? What are the actual dimensions of the art? Based on the scale, of 2 inches to 1 foot, wouldn't the actual mural have been 42 feet long?

[ Edited by Jethro on 2024-02-17 12:53:46 ]

[ Edited by Jethro on 2024-02-18 10:58:27 ]

I apologize for not getting back to you sooner. The piece sold very quickly in Palm Springs. I am taking it to my restorer for the buyer and will take a full picture when I deliver it to him. The mural was over 7' long, will get you exact dimensions once unwrapped again.

Dear fellow members, I recently acquired an original Frank Bowers mural painting, oil on canvas mounted on Masonite board. It was originally from Vivian Laird's Restaurant & Jungle Room. It's currently on eBay if you are curious to see it. I would like it to go to a good home that would appreciate it!